Yes, sometimes you get what you want and then a little bit more!
The day started beautifully with the sun shining all over the gentle waves. A nice change from some of the more cloudy and rainy days we had had in the North Atlantic.
It was another sea day, so our lectures were once again busy explaining the history of Greenland and the introductions to our first visit in Greenland in the town of Qaqortoq.
We also learned of the many various forms of ice we could encounter here in the Greenlandic waters and Janus told about his experiences during a 10 month stay in a very small North Greenlandic settlement.
Late in the afternoon we saw the first ice and shortly after entering the ice we were greeted by the first seal lying on the ice barely noticing us. It lifted its head, looked at us and then went back to sleep. Probably it was the seals first encounter with humans!
Late in the evening it started getting a bit more intensive with the ice. Around 10 pm Fram bumped into the first piece of ice in order for it to move, so we could pass through. Some 20 minutes later we bumped into the next ice flow and looking out from the windows we were more or less surrounded by ice.
It was a thrilling experience to stand out side on the deck and look at the ship muscle its way through the ice with its searchlights scanning to find a way through the immense masses of ice.
The ice was thick and combined with the fog it was hard to believe that Eric the Red had gone through the same conditions with just a small wooden ship in his endeavor to reach Greenland more than a thousand years ago.
Around 1 a.m. most of us went to bed to the sound and movements of Fram banging fairy gently into the ice flows.
